Damages
by adventuresinposting
Summary: Ben is in a car accident causing a fractured skull. Consequentially he remembers Dean. Ben tries to find Dean, who is now a retired hunter after losing Sam in a final battle. This is the story of Dean finding something and someone to replace the hole in his life left by Sam. Inspired by a tumblr post. Rated T for brief language.


**AN: **Like a lot of people here, this is my first story. Ever. I'm eager for reviews, so let me know your thoughts :) A few others have done a similar story, but I plan on taking this idea in a direction that I don't believe has been done yet. Or at least, I hope.

**AN2 (11.21.13):** I like to keep things as canon as possible, but I changed a few small details here to add suspense, drama, and color. Hey, it's fanfiction right? Technically, anything goes. Also I published this without a beta, because I don't know how that works. Plus it teaches me to proofread. Copy/pasting deleted some random words annoyingly, so this version includes all the words it's suppose to have.

I don't know why people put disclaimers. A friend of mine knows copyright law and says it makes zero difference if you put a disclaimer before using material and/or ideas. But I guess I'll still say that none of the characters are mind and they belong to our overlord Eric Kripke and the CW. etc.

This chapter is from Ben's POV. Set sometime in 2017.

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The first thing I become aware of is the pain. It isn't too bad, honestly, but I am more concerned about the fact that I had no idea _why_ my head felt like it had been cleaved in two. Slowly, feeling myself out of the fog my brain seemed to be in, I became aware of the rest of my body. My aching head, resting on a wonderfully comfortable pillow, my fingers, laid flat on something soft, my legs, heavy against what I now surmised to be a bed. As I became aware of my body, my other senses start waking up too. A rotten taste filled my mouth, like I had eaten a bunch of blue cheese and hadn't bothered to brush my teeth afterwards. An annoying, persistent beeping reaches my ears, making my head throb in painful rhythm with it. Hoping to find its source and make it _shut freaking up_ I slowly open my eyes.

Stark whiteness greets me, light peeking in through the closed blinds of a window at the other end of the room. A hospital. Well, that can't be anything good. Something happened to me, apparently. But what? I look around without moving my head. It was too heavy to bother. I glance down to find my right arm in a heavy white cast. Crap. My throwing arm. An IV line snakes around my left arm, ending in my hand. Both my arms are littered with scrapes and cuts, and I had a sneaking suspicion if I had a mirror I would find them on my face too. My head throbbed particularly painfully, and I close my eyes tight, willing the incessant beeping to stop. The darkness behind my eyes is soothing and comfortable, and I stay there.

I must have dozed off because the next thing I feel is the pain in my head again. But not like before. It's bad. It's like someone took a chisel and hammer and was using my head as a piece of marble, chipping away at it to sculpt a human head. I let out a low groan of pain. A small, warm hand finds my own. I open my eyes at the touch, this time finding a woman staring down at me.

"Hi sweetheart." the woman says, a wash of relief flooding her face as the corners of her mouth twitch up in a smile.

_Mom._

I want to say something, figure out what's going on. Let her know I'm ok. Maybe get some drugs in my system, which I'm guessing are wearing off by the increasing amount of pain I'm feeling. I guess I haven't been using my tongue much though, because it feels like a giant fruit roll up in my mouth. I lick my lips, trying to get them unstuck.

"How?", is all I can manage to croak out, the pain in my head stopping me from making a more coherent sentence. Just trying to talk makes me realize how tired I am. That one word took way too much effort. Whatever happened, it really must have hit me hard.

"Car accident baby." The woman- Mom- responds. She ever so gentle cups her soft hand around my cheek, her thumb making small comforting strokes on my face."You were driving back from the baseball field last night. There was a deer, and you swerved off the road to hit a tree. Hit your head pretty hard." Her big brown eyes, so much like my own, start to water a bit at those last words.

I give a tiny nod in acknowledgement. I close my eyes, trying to remember through the fog that still permeates my brain. A vague, fuzzy memory of Farming View Road creeps into my mind, the winding country road I always take home from the baseball fields where I spend a lot of my time with my friends. I love that road, beautiful all year round with the giant oak trees lining it. Never in the two years I had been driving that road had I seen a deer. So I was completely unprepared when I rounded a corner to see a deer staring straight at me, illuminated in my headlights. I remember feeling my heart stop as I panicked, adrenaline kicking in. I remember swerving to avoid it, acting on instinct more than choice. I remember the shape of a looming tree, one of the more majestic ones on that road, a brief moment of intense pain, and then nothing else.

Well now I knew what hit me. A freaking tree.

As the memory rushes back to me, as I realize that I must have hit that tree really damn hard, I start breathing too quickly. My heart monitor is going too fast, the beeping in tandem with the pounding in my head. The pounding in my head is making my stomach swirl and before I can try and stop it, I launch forward, Mom sensing what was about to happen and ready with a basin. I vomit whatever is in my system. All of it is too much. Mom helps me lean back, uttering soothing words of comfort, my head resting against the pillow again.

"Hurts Mom." I say quietly. I'm spent.

"I know, sweetheart, I know. Just sleep, ok? The nurse is here and she'll make everything feel better ok? I'm right here," her voice cracking with emotion.

I see a woman dressed in all white appear at my side just as the pain in my head reaches a crescendo. Out of the corner of my eye I see her fiddling with my IV. A few moments later there's a swirling sensation, and then blissful nothing.

I wake with a start. I had been dreaming. Some tall guy with a leather jacket had been in them. He had been talking to me while we sat on a bench in a park. There wasn't much more to it than that. I hugged him at some point. I think. It was all very fuzzy. But it was familiar too, as if it was more memory than dream. But I had no idea who this guy was. Weird. I dismiss it, attributing it to the mess of drugs I'm probably on.

I find Mom sleeping in a reclining chair next to my bed. Her dark hair frames her tanned face, her hands slack in her lap. Judging by the light coming through the window, it's late afternoon. I must have been here for at least a day, because I drove home late last night. Or was it the night before? Who knows. My head is heavy and fuzzy with drugs, pain, and the bandage I now sense to be wrapped around my head. I think about the last time I was in a hospital with my Mom. The roles had been reversed then, though. I was 10. Mom had been the one in a car accident. Some dumbass drunk driver. At least he had come in to apologize though, make sure she was ok.

And then it hits me. The man from my dream was the same man who had come to see us. Tall with blondish hair. Leather jacket. I didn't get it though. Why would I dream about him? It was a dream, right? Maybe my head was more banged up than I thought.

As if to verify that thought, my head pounds again and I squeeze my eyes shut against it. I hear a door open, and I open my eyes to see a man with kind eyes and a mop of white hair reading off the monitors next to my bed.

"Ah! You're awake. Good!" He says jovially. "I'm Dr. Vakamundi, or just Dr. V if you like. I'm glad to see you awake after two days of sleeping. Awfully lazy of you Benjamen." He gave me a small smile. His voice was light, his soft accent pleasant in my ears. "How's the pain?", Dr. V asks.

"Sucks." I respond, squeezing my eyes shut as I take full inventory of my weary banged up body. My tongue seems to have regained its normal shape and size at least, thank God. "And it's just Ben. Please." I add as an afterthought.

"Alright Ben. I'm not surprised. You banged your head pretty bad. Baseball bat in the backseat of your car decided it wanted to sit in the front, but found your head instead. Gave you a pretty nasty crack. Literally. You have a skull fracture, requiring 12 stitches. You also have some bruised ribs, and a broken right arm. And a wonderful collection of cuts and scrapes, as I'm sure you've noticed. But it's the head I'm most concerned about. We'll have to keep you for a few days to monitor."

I nod my head slightly as Dr. V starts checking me out; making me wiggle my toes, recite the months of year, recall where I was about to graduate from high school, shining a light in my eyes. The process of it all was exhausting and annoying, the pounding in my head picking up in intensity the longer Dr. V makes me do things. Surprisingly, Mom doesn't wake. She must have been here for a while already to sleep through all of Dr. V's ministrations. After a last round of questions, Dr. V gives a satisfied nod of his head as he makes the last notes on his notepad.

"You're doing quite well, all considering. Rest is all I can prescribe for now. Well, that and a little medicated help.", he says with a chuckle. I see him tap a syringe in his hand, plunging it into my IV line. He gives me a small wink when he notices I'm looking at him, his kind eyes reassuring. His smile is the last thing I register before the warm and comfortable darkness takes me under again.

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I go home a few days later, a big white bandage comically wrapped around my head and a matching cast on my arm. At home, Mom confines me to my bed on instructions from Dr. V: bed rest for the next two weeks. No sports, No strain, No shenanigans. Plenty of rest.

Plenty of boring if you ask me. I pass the time watching baseball on TV, and lamenting over my now totalled car. I couldn't ever stare at a screen for longer than 10 minutes or so; the bright light would make my head ache. A few friends stopped by after school most days, leaving me homework to catch up on. They only ever stay long enough for Mom to shoo them away, saying I needed quiet time. Thank God I had already finished my final exams, because there was no way I would be able to study with the letters on the pages jumping around all the time. Side effect of a skull fracture: completely disoriented and slightly dizzy almost all the time. There were still a few days until graduation, and really I just needed to bid my time until then. So, I slept a lot.

And I dreamed a lot. Nearly every night my dreams were filled with the image of the man in the leather jacket. I could no longer attribute it to hospital level pain meds, having been put on lower dose stuff since coming home. Sometimes he would be doing something, like teaching me about cars. Other times he would just be looking at me, his green eyes crinkling in a smile when I told my mother a particularly corny joke about, well, corn. It all felt so...right. So comfortable. It was like my brain was trying to tell me something, something that I needed to remember. But the more I tried to think about it, the more I tried to remember who this man was, the more confused I became.

About a week after I'de come home from the hospital, I took a fairly hefty dose of prescription pain meds. I had forced myself to read through the pain that day, bored out of my mind with nothing else to do. Now I was out of my mind with a headache. But with pain meds to look forward to I was planning to sleep well that night. Those drugs were _sweet_.

As was usual, the man in leather jacket was in my dream again. But it was far more vivid than any of the other dreams I'd had. And it was terrifying.

_My Mom and I were in some kind of warehouse, cold and confused. We were tied up, and utterly helpless against the two men standing guard over us. I was younger, not as strong as I am now. I was praying the leather jacketed man would come. Somehow I knew he would, that he would save my Mom and I. Not only because he cared about me, but also, I realized, because he loved my mother. With a sudden bang, the door to the warehouse room swung open, the man barging through it with his leather jacket swinging out behind him like a cape as he swung his fists at the men holding us captive. My own superhero. He beat them down, brandishing a knife. The room seemingly clear of danger, he cut the ropes binding us. But my mother grabs me from behind, somehow managing to grab the knife out of the man's hand. She held it to my throat. This wasn't my mother through - it couldn't be. My mother - or whatever was making my mother act like this- spoke. It was her voice, but there was an edge of savagery that my mother would never - could never- have. That scared me the most. She said the man was my real daddy. Said my mother was a slut. Said I was the biggest mistake in my mother's life. The man spoke to me, shouted my name, reassured me that everything was going to be ok. Told me that it wasn't my mom, to not listen to her. Told me that she was possessed. Possessed? What the hell does that mean? Before I could even process that information, the man threw water at us. My mother screamed as if she were on fire, the water burning her - no, burning the thing possessing her. The man tackled my mother, telling a "black eyed bitch" to get out of there. I stood frozen, panicked and shocked while I watched them struggle. The man started saying words in another language, making the thing inside my mother twitch and scream. The knife she still held is knocked out of her hand, and the man yells at me to pick it up. The thing grabs a sharp tool from the table she is pinned against. I watch in horror as she plunges the tool deep into her own abdomen, a devilish smirk on her face. "Finish the incantation now, Dean. Your precious woman is just a dead meat suit now". The man in the leather jacket screams, a sound of fear and panic and anger. It sends shivers down my spine. He says a few more words in that strange language and my mother falls to the ground as black smoke pours out of her mouth in a scream. My mother is bleeding on the floor. I freeze. The man slaps me, bringing me back to my senses and sternly instructing me to grab the shotgun he had brought. A shotgun? What the hell am I suppose to do with a shotgun? The man- Dean- instructs me in hurried words how to use it. A man with black eyes runs towards us, and Dean tells me to shoot. I do. It's the first time I've shot a gun, let alone shot a person. No, I tell myself, I shot the thing possessing the man. The demon. We're running. Running while the man carries my mother outside, blood coating his hands. There is fear in his green eyes. Panic. We briefly stop to unlock a door, freeing a tall man with long hair. He runs ahead, and comes back with a car. We clamor in, Dean still muttering words of comfort and reassurance to me. The door to the car slams shut._

I woke with a start, the slamming of the car door in my dream acting like a sudden electrical shock to my system. Sitting up quickly and breathing heavily one thought runs through my mind: _Dean. Dean Winchester_. That was the man's name. It was as clear to me as day. How could I forget about Dean? Green eyed, dirty blond haired, and leather jacketed Dean. Dean, the man who lived with my mother and me for a year, a long time ago. The man who could always- always- make my mother smile. The man who always found time to throw the baseball around with me. The man who saved us from demons, and ghosts, and God knows what else because _monsters were fucking real._ That final realization along with finally discovering the identity of my dream stalking, leather jacket wearing man had me sweating profusely and breathing heavily.

I swung my legs out of bed, the sheets sticking to my sweaty skin. I ran a shaky hand through my hair, finding the stitches at the base of my skull where the doctors had fixed my cracked head. That must have done it. The baseball bat to the head I took must have done something to stir my memory, to make me remember someone that I had no idea how I had forgotten. But how could I forget a whole person? Especially Dean? I leaned forward to let my head rest in my hands, my elbows propped up on my knees, the rough texture of my casted right hand rubbing against my cheek. I was sure this wasn't just a dream. The fear I felt was too real. The dreams- what I now knew to be memories- were too vivid.

"Dean." I whispered to the dark. "How could I forget you?"

I needed to find him. The need was sudden, but deep. I needed Dean. Needed him to know that I remembered him. Needed him to know how much he had meant to me in that year. More than anything, I needed to know why he wasn't here now.

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I didn't sleep the rest of that night, replaying the warehouse scene in my mind over and over again. The demon's words kept repeating in my mind. "He's your real daddy you know". Could that be true? I had never known my father. Dean had always been the closest thing I had had to a father, even if it had been only for that one year. So why couldn't he be? And why wouldn't my mother tell me that? And most of all, where was Dean now? The never ending questions frustrated me.

When the sun peeked through my window, I went downstairs to make coffee. The beauty of the internet is that it's always on. So even at 5 in the morning, sun barely risen, I could pop open my laptop, the sudden bright light making my head ache annoyingly. Damn head. My casted right arm was difficult to type with, but I managed to enter Dean Winchester into the search bar.

Nothing.

I search everywhere, my coffee gone cold, forgotten in my search. But Dean had managed to disappear from the world just as well and as suddenly as he had disappeared from my life. I debated asking Mom about him. Somehow I knew that what had made me forget Dean had made her forget him too. And I didn't need to cause my mother pain by trying to force her to remember a long lost love. Because just as sure that I now knew Dean's name, I knew my mother had loved him. No, my mother as a source of information was out.

Frustrated, I pulled out my phone and texted my friend Jack. He was the kid people went to when they needed a fake. He knew his technology, and people knew him for it.

_Hey man I have a favor to ask. I'm looking for an old friend, and Google's not helping. Can you see if you can find anyone by the name of Dean Winchester for me?_

I sent the text, tapping my foot impatiently on the floor. It was still early, and a Saturday at that. No way he would answer for at least a few hours.

I huff out a weary sigh, letting my head fall back against the back of the coach. I close my eyes, weary from staring at a computer screen, my head aching from the bright light.

My need to find Dean was like a fire burning in my chest. But how do you find a man that has disappeared? Was Dean even still alive?


End file.
